Boyda will track use of water rights by the village and oversee conservation efforts

Eric Boyda was introduced last week to Ruidoso village councilors and the public as the village's new water rights/conservation specialist. Not only will he track the village's use of its water rights, he also will oversee various efforts to conserve water.

"Back in May we received a letter from the office of the state engineer and learned that some concerns were voiced by State Engineer Tom Blaine about our water rights," Village manager Debi Lee told councilors. "There were conditions of these water rights that we had requested an extension on and the state engineer's office believed we needed to really hone in on the importance of making water rights a priority. We began to meet every Tuesday for about three hours with the state engineer's (staff).In doing so, (Community Development Director) Greg Cory, (Deputy Manager) Ron Sena, (Public Works Director) J. R Baumann, (Water Distribution Manager) Adam Sanchez and (Water Production Manager) Randy Koehn began to learn all the detailed intricacies of our water rights.

"As a result, it was determines and was one of your priorities that we hire somebody to assist us and make it a full time job and priority for the community. We advertised and I'm grateful we had the opportunity to hire Eric Boyda."

Boyda earned a bachelor's degree in South Dakota with a double major wildlife sciences and environmental management, and a master;s degree in biological sciences with an emphasis on management and minor in statistics, she said, adding, "This gentlemen is well educated and incredibly smart."

"When we were meeting with the state engineer, it was this guy who taught us," Lee said. "He diligently went through each water right permit, all those conditions and explained how that works with our water delivery system"

His relationship with village staff began to gel as he went over how they could better manager water rights "and the importance of our impact on other people not only in this community, but downstream users.".

As she asked Boyda to stand up, Lee added, "This is what a genius looks like."

Boyda said he's really excited about his new position and that he felt "a lot of synergy" among staff.

Noting his speech was brief, Lee said Boyda is "kind of a quiet guy,but what we learned about him is when you ask him (a question), he has a lot to say.".